


If I profane...

by fannishliss



Series: Kink List [10]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Artist Steve Rogers, Hands, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Pre-Captain America: The First Avenger, basically Steve and Bucky's lifelong love affair, my kink list series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-13
Updated: 2015-03-13
Packaged: 2018-03-17 17:08:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3537368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fannishliss/pseuds/fannishliss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve is an artist and Bucky loves his hands.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If I profane...

**Author's Note:**

> The Kink List said "Bodies and Body Parts" which, in the context of the Winter Soldier, is pretty alarming! But then it just meant to erotically focus on one part of the body. Knowing how handsy Mr. Evans is, I extended that to Steve, and I also thought that Bucky would be especially entranced by Steve when he is working on art -- especially if the art features Bucky himself. 
> 
> I wish I had the talent to make the pastel nude of Bucky. I can almost see it in my mind's eye, especially his clear blue eyes and devilish little grin. :)

Bucky fell in love with Steve the first moment they met. There was an irresistible contrast between his soft, golden, babyish appearance, his big blue eyes and milky skin, and the mouth on him, the gall of him, the daring. Nothing could keep him down; his physical limitations meant nothing to him. From the start, Bucky had to admire the sheer nerve of Steve, such a feisty little wolf in puppy clothing.

Bucky loved that delightful combination of spiky personality and physical beauty, but that was never the sum total of why Bucky was so entirely captivated. Sure, he enjoyed crossing the line of caution, dancing with danger — what kid didn’t? 

Over time, Bucky came to realize that he’d fallen right away, but it was when he understood the artist in Steve that he fell the hardest. Steve looked hard at the world, noticing every detail; light and color fascinated him, little things Bucky would never even notice, like the way the shadows of a fence fell across the sidewalk, or how the fluttering of laundry danced a festive riot in front of a brick wall. 

Steve captured the world in images, held them in his brain, and sketched them out, constantly, on paper. Bucky loved to watch Steve work, the quick, sure strokes of his pencil as he brought his subjects to life. Steve’s hands were nothing special, not especially long or slender and certainly not refined or patrician. He had bunchy knuckles from throwing too many punches, and peasant hands, from a long line of laborers. Steve had strong, mannish hands on a man who never had grown very big. Those hands embodied several contradictions, all unified into one incomprehensible whole — the hands of a fighter, an artist, a thinker, a worker, a boy who fascinated Bucky Barnes from the moment they met, and forever afterwards. 

*  
Steve seemed to be under the impression that Bucky found it a chore to sit while Steve sketched him. 

That was not the case, however Bucky refused to take off every stitch of clothing, the way the models did for Steve’s life drawing class. He had to reserve a little dignity to himself, because he gave every other last part of himself to Steve. He loved to sit shirtless and bask in Steve’s dissecting gaze. Bucky knew he was a looker; he saw how the women (and men) around him reacted when he smiled. He used it a little, to get good dance partners, and he had to admit he was never hard up for company. 

But Steve’s eyes on him were the only ones that mattered, Steve’s sure hands tracing out his contours, making him more real on paper than he often felt in daily life. Steve’s eyes and hands elevated Bucky’s everyday existence into art. It was almost too much, when he thought about it, so he tried not to think too hard, just fell back into the even breaths and the dreamlike state of waiting until Steve was satisfied. 

He held the pose and daydreamed of kissing those charcoal stained fingers, smearing them all over himself until he was a canvas covered in Steve’s expressive smudges. 

* 

“A nude? That’s a little too far, don’t you think, pal?” Bucky protested. 

“Come on, now, Buck,” Steve cajoled. “It’s nothing I haven’t seen before.” 

Steve was right, of course; the place they shared was just one room, and most of their bathing they did standing at the kitchen sink, preferring their privacy to the traipse down the hall to the shared bathroom that was plumbed for hot water. Steve and Bucky had grown up in each other’s pockets, and more than that, Bucky had nursed Steve through illnesses and patched him up after fights. Steve’s body wasn’t a mystery to him, after so many frigid nights, warming his friend in his arms. But somehow they’d kept a modesty between them that they still tried to preserve. Bucky knew he loved Steve more than he’d ever loved anyone, but he still fought to keep that feeling from making an idol of Steve’s body or his angelic face. 

His hands, though? It was too late. If Bucky had to sit naked while Steve captured him in blurred oil pastels, he’d lose what was left of his mind. 

But Steve, of course, wore him down. It didn’t take much effort on Steve’s part before Bucky was nude, in a chair, by the window, Steve working furiously to make the most of the light. The way Steve gripped the pastel crayons, the darting motions as he lined Bucky’s form onto the paper…. the way those brilliant hues collaged themselves onto Steve’s fingers the longer he worked… it was mesmerizing. It felt so good, just holding still for Steve, letting Steve’s bright gaze take him apart and remake him there on the paper, his own body glowing in the sheen of color Steve worked into the paper’s surface. He felt like he was floating… the world seemed remote in the haze of afternoon light as he sat in the window, posing for Steve. It felt like a beautiful dream, so right and so good. 

“Take five, Bucky,” Steve said, and coughed, his face red. 

Bucky came to himself and understood Steve’s embarrassment — he was fully erect and hadn’t even realized it. 

Mortification hit him like a bucket of ice water as he pulled a blanket quickly over his lap. What was Steve thinking — what did he think Bucky was thinking? 

Bucky turned his back to Steve and tried to control himself. His thoughts were racing, his emotions all over the place — fear, shame— yet still, there were those undercurrents of need — need to show Steve just how good he could be, need to submit himself to the dictates of Steve’s art, need for Steve to use him however Steve wanted. 

Bucky stood and stretched, wrapped up in the blanket, and walked over to the sink to drink a glass of water. 

“Pleasant thoughts?” Steve asked, politely enough, but Bucky could hear the little punk’s smirk. 

“You want me to model for you, punk, keep your questions to yourself,” Bucky growled. 

“Sorry,” Steve said, the happy teasing tone banished clean out of his voice. 

Bucky drank another half glass of cold water, rotated all his joints, and went back to the chair. 

“You don’t gotta do this,” Steve said, serious. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.” 

“Too damn comfortable,” Bucky murmured, “if you ask me.” 

He managed to keep from drifting in the second session. Steve added some finishing touches before the light faded. He resolutely kept his mind off the way Steve’s fingers stroked the paper, caressing the pigments into a beautiful dream of Bucky’s own body. 

*  
Steve’s beloved hand, reaching out for him, big and strong, but all in vain, was the last he saw of his friend until the century turned. 

*  
They took Bucky’s hands and made them into the hands of a killer. One they replaced entirely with a whirring silver thing that somehow spoke with his brain, yet still did their evil bidding. 

Every so often he would surface, when they left him out of cryo too long, when he didn’t give himself away and get the wipe… his miraculous body would adapt to the drugs and he’d run, but he never made it home… there was no home left to run to. 

Until, at last, he reached down into the depths of the Potomac and left Steve lying half-drowned on the shore. Fresh off a wipe, he still remembered Steve — but his own hands had betrayed him — hurting Steve before saving him — he needed time to get himself together. Instinctively he knew his body and mind would recover. He knew Steve would always be waiting. 

*  
All it took was one phone call to Avengers Tower when he was finally ready. Steve had him in his arms within an hour, crying onto his shoulder, laughing, rocking them back and forth, touching him all over, reassuring himself that Bucky was real. 

Bucky wasn’t absolutely positive he was real — here in this castle in the clouds — a billionaire playboy’s mansion with a whole floor reserved for him and Stevie? 

But there was Steve’s taste in art on the walls. There on the table was a big volume of Michelangelo. There, somehow, was Bucky’s own parents’ kitchen table, SGR and JBB carved low into one of the legs. Hydra couldn’t have known these things, or, if they did, Bucky wanted to keep on dreaming. 

Steve wouldn’t stop touching him… one hand always on him or hovering near. Bucky didn’t mind; in fact he fawned to the touch like a dog and felt himself begging for more. 

Steve caught on quick, glued to his side, touching him with a freedom Bucky had craved his entire life, but never more than now. 

Bedtime came early that first night, and Steve clearly saw that Bucky didn’t want the guest room. They brushed their teeth side by side in Steve’s master bathroom, just like they always had, and when it came time to settle under the bedclothes, nothing was easier than the way Bucky fit against Steve’s back. Bucky’d spent so much time thawing and unthawing, in and out of cryo, he felt like the ice was still hard in his marrow, but with Steve in his arms, he felt so safe and warm. The best was the way Steve clutched at his arms, holding Bucky in place like he’d never let him go. 

Bucky settled into Steve’s new life like he settled into Steve’s big bed — like the intervening years they’d lost had simply drifted away. Bucky and Steve were back together, happy again, like they always were before the war. 

Now Bucky sometimes trained with Steve; he wanted to be ready if Steve was called for action. He wouldn’t dream of letting Steve leave to fight alone. Bucky’s therapist asked how he felt about fighting. 

“I was already a trained army sniper when Hydra got me. Defending Steve was what I was always meant to do. Now I’m back where I belong, I want to be able to do what I do best. If I’m declared fit for action, I’ll follow Steve anywhere.” For Bucky it was as simple as that. The atrocities he’d committed for Hydra still haunted him, but they were hazy, hidden from his conscious mind by all the things Hydra had used to control him. In his heart, Bucky, like Steve, had always been a fighter, and he wanted to stick by Steve’s side, no matter what. 

Bucky was glad that Steve still pursued his art. He always kept a notebook in his pocket, ready to jot down an idea or outline a sketch, and he still worked on copying old masters when he had free time. He and Bucky went to the Met and walked the familiar halls, amazed at the decades of artistic progress. He listened to Steve wax rhapsodic about the trajectory of non-representational art, and they stood in front of one pulsating Rothko for minutes on end. 

“I never would have been able to see this,” Steve said, in wonder. “Part of this is a shade of red I couldn’t see. I have Dr. Erskine to thank.” 

Bucky was glad of what the serum had done for Steve, though he himself had many times wished the serum in himself would fail and leave him in peace. He was so glad now that it never had. 

A few days later, Stark ordered a trunk delivered to their floor. 

“Dad had some of your things held back, and this was deliberately mislabeled.” Tony pointed to a label that read “Stephanie Grace Richards.” “Dad kind of got around. He knew a lot of ladies, and he had a lot of crap in storage. So sue me for not making the connection earlier.” 

He stood and watched while Steve looked at the trunk. “Aren’t you going to open it?” he prompted. 

Steve frowned. “Would you mind if I opened it in private?” 

Tony heaved a sigh. “Okay, if you don’t want me to know what I’ve been keeping safe for seventy years, and by the way, you two snow angels are still safe because you live in my building…” but he was already on the way out the door. 

Steve tried 7 - 4 - 18 on the padlock, and it opened. He had some ideas what would be inside. 

“This is all the art,” Steve said to Bucky. 

“Yeah?” Bucky said, not comprehending. 

“Howard and Peggy transferred most of our stuff to the Smithsonian. But the Museum never had the art. Now we know why.” 

“Stark didn’t think it was good enough?” Bucky frowned. In his opinion, Steve was a genius with oil pastels. 

“Peggy must have told him it was private,” Steve said. “I’m actually really glad they respected my wishes.” 

“You would have been another great twentieth-century master,” Bucky enthused. 

“Probably not,” Steve said. “I’m just glad I got it all back. It means a whole lot to me, and probably very little to anyone else except you.” 

“Let’s see it,” Bucky encouraged, so together, they unpacked the trunk. Bucky recognized the sketchbooks — many of them filled with juvenilia, most of them he himself had given Steve. He remembered most of the drawings too, work Steve had done for school, and from his portfolio. 

Then they came to the pastels, where Steve had really come into his own as an artist. At the bottom of the stack was the nude of Bucky. Steve delicately pulled it from the trunk.

“Do you remember….?” Steve said. 

“Of course I remember,” Bucky answered. 

The nude was exquisite. Bucky glowed in the afternoon light of that long ago day, his form picked out by halos of light. The blue of his eyes was radiant as his gaze was locked somewhere in the middle distance. A subtle smile played on Bucky’s lips. Bucky’s physical perfection was rendered as a study in eroticism, captured in bright Fauvist carmine, copper, chartreuse, cerise. The light loved Bucky, the painter loved Bucky, and the smile showed that Bucky loved back. 

“Jesus,” Bucky breathed, darting a glance at Steve. 

“Huh,” Steve said, his eyes dilated, his whole face slack. 

“Do you,” Bucky asked, heart pounding, “Stevie —could you — still see me — like that?” 

“Oh my god, Bucky,” Steve said, his voice shaking. “I can’t see anything else. I have never seen anything else.” 

They fell together like titans, pulled by a gravity they’d fought since childhood. 

“Steve, I love you, I love you so much, I’m so sorry,” Bucky choked as Steve kissed him and held him and stroked him all over, and Bucky fought to press himself into Steve as hard as he could with every inch of skin. 

“Sh, Bucky, I gotcha, I gotcha now Buck,” Steve murmured, petting and soothing Bucky all over with his careful, strong hands. 

They had their shared nervous breakdown there on the rug in Steve’s living room, sketchbooks scattered all around, the nude propped up against Steve’s leather sofa. 

“Fuck,” Bucky said. “My throat hurts from crying.” 

“Mine too,” Steve said, cracking a smile. 

“You got any beer?” Bucky asked. 

Steve looked at Bucky like he was crazy. “They pumped me full of serum, Buck, but they couldn’t drain out the Irish.” 

Steve had Schaefer in cans in the back of his fridge, scoffed at by every other Avenger (even Clint), but the watery lager tasted like home to Steve and Bucky, reminding them of Dodgers games and the good times they’d shared before they were soldiers. 

The beer soothed their throats and quenched their thirst and gave them time to calm down. 

Bucky reached over and captured Steve’s hand and put it on his thigh, looking Steve in the eye. 

Steve blushed and smiled and didn’t back down. 

“Christ, what a couple of dummies,” Bucky said, rolling his eyes. Steve laughed happily, ducking his chin and batting his lashes in that cunning way he had when he knew exactly how adorable he was. 

Bucky lifted Steve’s hand and kissed it, and Steve smiled on, unflappable. 

Okay, Bucky thought, and set himself free. He lifted Steve’s hand and pressed it against his cheek, closing his eyes. He could feel Steve’s thoughts — Steve was in love with him, Steve wanted to be gentle and sensual, Steve was trembling just the tiniest bit, holding himself back, Steve wanted to throw him down on the rug and swarm all over him, unleashing the mighty passion he’d held in check all these years — but Steve wasn’t gonna do that, he was curious to see what Bucky wanted, and there was plenty of time for the rest of it. All this Steve’s hand imprinted into Bucky’s cheek, and Bucky opened his eyes to peek at Steve. Steve’s face, his heavily lidded eyes, blown pupils and parted lips confirmed it all. 

“God damn,” Bucky said, “Steve, you are so good looking.” 

Steve, predictably, blushed, the color deepening his already flushed complexion. 

Once open, Bucky’s mouth rambled on. “Do you know how long I have lusted after this hand? My whole life. My whole damned life, Steve, you know that?” 

Steve frowned slightly and shook his head a little. 

“You remember Romeo and Juliet?” Bucky said. Steve nodded; they’d studied it together in high school. 

Bucky took Steve’s hand in both of his, one warm flesh and one cold steel, and breathed a delicate kiss against Steve’s palm. "If I profane with my unworthiest hand,” Bucky quoted, “this holy shrine, the gentle sin is this: my lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.” 

Steve shivered but managed to remember the answer, his deep voice smooth as coffee and dark as chocolate. “Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, which mannerly devotion shows in this; for saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, and palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.”

Bucky leaned a little closer, not sure he had the right line. “Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?” 

Steve jumped to the point, breathing,  “Give me that sin again.” 

Their lips came lightly together, soft and tremulous, testing the way. 

Steve’s hand rose up and he stroked Bucky’s cheek of his own accord, and Bucky moaned. 

“Touch me, Steve,” he begged. Steve’s hand glided down his cheek, caressed his jaw, and spanned his throat in a loose, sweet grip. Bucky shook as Steve kissed him and touched him, just like a dream. 

Steve’s gentle hands explored his body — his shoulders, his back, his sensitive sides, his stomach, and then, at Bucky’s nod, they were opening his pants. Bucky had to remind himself to breathe, to keep his eyes open: this was all real, this was happening, it was not a vague wish or a desperate fantasy — Steve was here, holding him close, taking his hardening flesh in his hands, loving him, gentle and perfect, strong and soft and breathing warm next to him— 

“Bucky,” Steve whispered, “Jesus, Bucky!” He was hard against Bucky’s hip, thrusting a little as he held Bucky close. 

“Oh, Steve, like that, just like that, let me — !” Bucky broke off with a cry, spilling into Steve’s palm. 

The world was full of light, so sweet, so good. Bucky lazily lifted Steve’s hand and licked it clean, then turned and opened Steve’s pants and swallowed him down. 

They collapsed on the living room floor, Steve’s art all around them. Steve’s hand was in Bucky’s hair, Bucky’s ear was pressed against Steve’s miraculous heartbeat, the drummer for all his days, from the beginning, and from now on.

**Author's Note:**

> Schaefer was brewed in Brooklyn and was for many years the world’s most popular beer. I’m sure Steve and Bucky would also love a Guinness as a treat, but Schaefer would have been their everyday beer.  
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schaefer_Beer  
> At Ebbet’s Field (the Dodgers stadium) the Schaefer beer ad right over the scoreboard lit up the H and the E to show the official ruling on hits and errors. 
> 
>  
> 
> Romeo and Juliet I.v ... It was commonplace in the old days for students to memorize long pieces of prose and poetry. They would have known poems, speeches, political documents, Shakespeare, passages from the Bible, lots of different things by heart. That gave rise to parodies, like "The boy stood on the burning deck, eating peanuts by the peck," a favorite of my grandmother, or in Monty Python, when the Inquisition are drilled in their chief weapons. 
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks very much for reading -- please let me know if you liked it!
> 
> Prompts are always welcome, and if you have any kinks you'd like to see on the List, please let me know. 
> 
> Up next: Bodily Secretions. :D


End file.
